No to X99 and yes to Z170M

Kronos

Kronos

Kronos

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You've chosen a decent amount of RAM there, but for Skylake I'd go with what pasty suggests and get a dual-channel kit. It's faster, as well as being the same price and leaves you with upgrade space for the future.

I'd also consider getting the Gigabyte board instead. It's the same price but Gigabyte have a UK RMA centre should anything go wrong. MSI's BIOS flash utilities have been known to be a bit wonky sometimes - not sure how it is with their newer boards.
 
pastymuncher said:
Faster ram, same price and only a pair of sticks so you aren't filling all of your slots.

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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Personally I would take a Gigabyte board over a MSI one anyday.

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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Click to expand...

Thanks for your response.

I actually want to fill the 4 slots, more bling.

As for the choice of mobo, I have had both brands without issues so what in your opinion gives the Gigabyte the edge?
 
Borealis said:
You've chosen a decent amount of RAM there, but for Skylake I'd go with what pasty suggests and get a dual-channel kit. It's faster, as well as being the same price and leaves you with upgrade space for the future.

I'd also consider getting the Gigabyte board instead. It's the same price but Gigabyte have a UK RMA centre should anything go wrong. MSI's BIOS flash utilities have been known to be a bit wonky sometimes - not sure how it is with their newer boards.
Click to expand...

Just looked at the comparison and to be honest I am still inclined towards the MSI, though I agree that the BIOS updating can be troublesome but I do have an older board on my secondary PC, a MSI B751A-E33.

And I repeat I want the four slots filled I cannot envisage ever needing more than 16Gb of RAM.
 
Better customer service with Gigabyte plus it's highly unlikely to brick the board when updating the bios unlike the MSI.

To be honest you don't seem to want to budge so why bother asking for people's opinions? Just buy what you want.
 
Personally I'd never buy a GB board again after seeing the aggro my friend has had with his X99 setup. Seen s couple of people on here reporting similar issues.

Or with the grief I had with my 780Ti and its multiple failures/repairs/arguments with support and having to get the forum rep and head of UK sales involved in to resolve.

Asus or MSI for me from now on, I know their support and RMA isn't perfect but I'd rather have a board that stands a fighting chance of making the warranty period rather than one I'll have to return.
 
Kronos said:
No to X99 and yes yo Z170M
Click to expand...

Any particular reason not to go for X99?


Kronos said:
I actually want to fill the 4 slots, more bling
Click to expand...

Kronos said:
And I repeat I want the four slots filled I cannot envisage ever needing more than 16Gb of RAM.
Click to expand...

Whether you can envisage needing it or not, I don't see why you would intentionally limit yourself. Additionally 4 sticks placing slightly more stress on the memory controller, and if overclocking (which I assume is why you are getting a K series chip/Z170 board for) can impact on what is achievable.

As for "bling", it's not like the memory you have chosen is the "blingiest", and with the black motherboard you have picked, why would it matter if the ram slots were un-populated, it would still look fine.



pastymuncher said:
To be honest you don't seem to want to budge so why bother asking for people's opinions? Just buy what you want.
Click to expand...

It does seem like a bit of Purchase Justification rather than actually taking on other people's opinions that you have actually asked for.
 
Armageus said:
Additionally 4 sticks placing slightly more stress on the memory controller, and if overclocking (which I assume is why you are getting a K series chip/Z170 board for) can impact on what is achievable.

As for "bling"...
Click to expand...

Back in the day, more than 2 sticks usually meant dropping the command rate by 1 clock cycle (from 1T to 2T, or less commonly 2T to 3T). This made the performance difference between 2 sticks and 4 sticks pretty large.

This seems to be less of a problem with DDR3 and 4 though (they get a lot more done that missing a cycle here or there isn't an issue).

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-2158741/dram-command-rate-explained.html

Still, a sub-optimal config for the sake of "bling" isn't the way I'd go.
 
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